


What Was Real

by Disenchantress



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, POV Solas
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-15
Updated: 2015-12-15
Packaged: 2018-05-06 19:55:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5428694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Disenchantress/pseuds/Disenchantress
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Solas recounts his history with the Inquisitor, realizing as he does how she has defied his expectations - and repeatedly proven him wrong - nearly every step of the way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Was Real

Taliel Lavellan was… a surprise, to say the least. Though I had observed the Anchor while she slept, my attention had been focused on _it_ more than on _her_. I had done my best to stop its growth, to find a way to remove it, but when I failed, I never expected her to live, no matter what I told the Seeker. So when she burst in with Cassandra just as Varric and I were being overrun by demons, I was shocked enough that for one foolish moment, I thought she must have been a spirit taking on the dead girl’s form.

But Lavellan was too obviously _alive_ for that. Not that spirits aren’t vital, but a spirit's essence is rarely elastic enough to support the full gamut of short-lived emotions that flashed across her face in that moment. First curiosity, then surprise, and finally a mask of stony resolve.

In battle, she was focused—almost unbelievably so. She appeared in a strike of lightning and as she walked through it, I could have sworn the magic flashed from her eyes as well. I am a little ashamed to admit how long it took me to realize that her eyes were just the _color_ of magic. I hadn’t seen eyes that color in… well, a very long time.

The Seeker barreled past me, crashing into something with her shield with exactly the eloquence I had come to expect from her, and I whirled to make her target my own. I hesitated again when I felt an unexpected prickle of magic, foreign but not unfriendly, begin to unfurl itself and then wrap around me. When I saw the barrier shimmer into being around Cassandra as well, I was suitably impressed. Lavellan was fighting with her back to us, but the magic enveloped her too; her awareness of the battlefield was incredible to catch us all in her spell without even looking back.

The unexpected reinforcements made the fight a short one. Varric took down the last demon grimly, and as Lavellan returned her staff to her back, I grasped her left wrist.

What had been a relieved sigh turned into a short, surprised gasp at the sudden contact. Those intense eyes snapped to mine, a little wider than they had been a moment before, but she did not pull away. I had no time to allay her fears or more demons could pour through the rift, but I found myself shouting the explanation anyway as I guided her hand forward. The magic burning from her palm connected to the rift with a green tether that snapped and dripped raw power.

Lavellan did not cry out, but I could not but feel her muscles tense and see her fingers spasm. It could not be painless, to channel the Anchor’s power so.

As suddenly as it had begun, the tear imploded and the link was broken. She ripped her wrist away, curling her left hand into a loose fist that trembled only slightly. Her eyes were different when she looked at me this time—cautious, suspicious, searching. I knew immediately I could not give the answers she sought.

“What did you do?” she gasped. I could see her still fighting the urge to grasp at the Anchor with her other hand, to try to massage away the pain. Sadly, it wouldn’t have worked anyway. But it proved she was controlled, perhaps stronger than she looked, and would rather endure in silence than show me her weakness. After all, she wasn’t yet certain if I was ally or enemy.

In the grand scheme, neither was I.

“I? Nothing,” I assured her, in what was certain to be the first of many lies to come.

For her part, Lavellan seemed surprised but encouraged that the mark upon her palm had accomplished something none of the rest of us had. Cassandra, ever to the point, leapt immediately to whether the same tactic could be used to seal the Breach, which I admitted was possible.

Folding my hands and hoping the action didn’t look as awkward as it felt, I told Lavellan slowly, “It seems you hold the key to our salvation.” This time, I could not read her expression, though her eyes stayed locked on mine until Varric broke in with his customary wit.

She turned as Varric introduced himself, seizing the opportunity to grate on the Seeker’s nerves as no one else could. Sounding uncertain, Lavellan tilted her head slightly to one side and asked if he was with the Chantry.

Well, of course that did it. Perhaps Varric was rubbing off on me already; before I could think to do otherwise, I had chuckled and snarked, “Was that a serious question?”

Violet eyes darted back toward me just for a moment, and the blush creeping across her cheekbones and the tips of her ears was unmistakable. As well as she hid pain, clearly she was terrible at disguising embarrassment. Did she really know so little of the Chantry? Yet hadn’t she been at the Conclave?

That thought preoccupied me as Varric introduced his crossbow as if it were a person, as he was prone to do, and then began to argue with Cassandra, as they always did. It was only when the Seeker turned her back with a disgusted noise that I saw fit to interject and introduce myself as well.

Then Varric told Lavellan I had kept the mark from killing her while she slept and at his word she thanked me, something that caused me no small amount of guilt. My actions had hardly been entirely altruistic, and gratitude was something I had not come to expect from the pale shadows of my people that now walked Thedas.

Had I realized at the time just how entirely she would come to defy my expectations, I might have been more careful in my dealings with her. I might have sought a means to leave the Inquisition sooner. I might have tried other tactics, searched for other options, but each idea is more unlikely than the one before.

In the end, I would always have stayed and fallen in love with her anyway.


End file.
